government that the governor and his legal advisers had been in error in determining that the Tuscaloosa must be regarded as a duly commissioned ship of war. An account has also been given of the seizure of that vessel, and of the orders which were given by the government for her release, on the special ground that, the vessel having been, once allowed to enter and leave the port as a recognized ship of war, and no warning having been given to the officer in charge of her of any change of intention on the part of the authorities, he was fairly entitled to assume that she would be again received in the same character. The Tuscaloosa did not, however, return into the hands of the confederate government, but was eventually handed over at the end of the war to the United States consul at Cape Town.1

Of the amount of coal supplied to the Georgia at the Cape of Good Hope there is no record. It would seem that 180 tons were forwarded to Simon's Bay for the use of the Alabama on the 19th September, 1863. The Alabama proceeded to the Indian Ocean, and took in a fresh supply (250) tons at Singapore on the 23d December. She returnd to the Cape of Good Hope on the 20th March, 1864, and it is stated in the case of the United States that, on the 21st, she began taking on board fresh supplies of coal. The interval between the two supplies is thus made out to be two days less than three calender months, and this is adduced asa "fresh violation of the duties of Great Britain as a *neutral." [117] The authority given is a book entitled "My Adventures Afloat," published by Captain Semmes, the commander of the Alabama. One of the passages referred to is as follows, (p. 744:)

172

We entered Table Bay on the 20th of March, and on the next day (i. c., the 21st) we had the usual equinoctial gale. The gale having moderated The Alabama at the the next day, (i. e., the 22d,) lighters came alongside, and we began Cape of Good Hope. coaling.

The Alabama did not, therefore, begin coaling at Table Bay on the 21st, but on the 22d of March, 1864.

Again, on referring to another book published by Captain Semmes, "The Cruise of the Alabama and Sumter," the following passage is found relative to the visit of the Alabama at Singapore, (p. 234:)

Tuesday, December 22.-At 9.30 a.m. the pilot came on board, and we ran up to the New Harbor alongside of the coaling-depot and commenced coaling.

And on referring to the passage of the "Adventures Afloat," on the same subject, it will be found stated that the "coaling lasted ten hours."3

It is proved, therefore, from the very authority quoted by the United States, that the Alabama had taken in her last supply of coal not on the 23d but on the 22d of December, 1863, and that the specified period of three months had exactly elapsed before she began taking in a fresh supply. But if the dates had really been as alleged, the circumstance would have proved nothing against the colonial authorities, still less against Great Britain. The captain of the Alabama applied for permission to coal on the ground that he had last coaled at Singapore on or about the 21st of December. The governor and admiral could have had no means of checking the date to a single day, and the permission was granted on the faith of Captain Semmes's statement. That statement was in every way consistent with probability, and with the facts as far as they were or could be known at Cape Town. It would surely be nothing less than ridiculous that an asserted "violation of

1 British Case, p. 115.

Case of the United States, pp. 316, 385. 3 Page 715.

the duties of Great Britain as a neutral" should be found to depend on a doubtful mistake of a single day, on the difference between lunar or calendar months, or on the fact that a particular February fell in leap year.

There are records, on the other hand, of eleven visits of United States men-of-war to the Cape of Good Hope, three of which received coal; but Her Majesty's government will only call the attention of the tribunal to one of these, the Vanderbilt. This vessel obtained at the British colony of St. Helena on the 18th of August, 1863, 400 tons of coal. She arrived at Simon's Bay, Cape of Good Hope, on the 3d of September, rather more than a fortnight afterward, and remained until the 11th, taking on board 1,000 tons of coal. She visited the British colony of Mauritius a fortnight later, on the 24th of the same month, and there remained till the 10th of October, shipping a fresh supply of 618 tons. On the 22d of that month, only twelve days after her departure from Mauritius, she re-appeared at Cape Town, and her commander applied for permission to remain five or six working days, for the purpose of making necessary repairs, and also to get a supply of fuel. The governor, as the captain reports, "took a day to decide," and then replied, granting the permission for the Vanderbilt to remain in harbor, but stating that he did not think his instructions would admit of his giving permission to her to coal, especially as it was notorious that the three supplies so recently received had been expended in cruising. She thus committed in six weeks two apparently deliberate breaches of the regulations, and attempted a third. The case of the Vanderbilt does not certainly show any hostile rigor on the part of the authorities at the British colonies which that vessel visited.

Recapitulation.

RECAPITULATION.

Her Majesty's government has now, it is believed, examined all the instances brought forward in the case of the United States to support the charge of "excessive hospitalities" on the part of British authorities to confederate cruisers and of "discourtesies to vessels of war of the United States." The examination has shown how groundless is that charge, and with how little reason it can be said that the rules laid down as to the treatment of belligerent vessels "were

often utterly disregarded" in the case of confederate ships of [118] war, and *"rigidly enforced against the United States." A few

words only require to complete the comparison. During the course of the civil war ten confederate cruisers visited British ports. The total number of such visits was twenty-five, eleven of which were made for the purpose of effecting repairs. Coal was taken in at sixteen

On

of these visits, and on sixteen occasions the limit of stay fixed by the regulations was exceeded. In one of these cases, however, the excess was no more than two hours, and in another, the delay was enforced in order to allow twenty-four hours to elapse between the departure of a United States merchant-vessel and that of the confederate cruiser. the other hand, the returns which have been procured of visits of United States vessels of war to ports of Great Britain and the colonies, though necessarily imperfect, show an aggregate total of 228 such visits. On thirteen of these, repairs were effected; on forty-five occasions supplies of coal were obtained; and the twenty-four hours' limit of stay was forty-four times exceeded. The total amount of coal obtained by con

1

1 Appendix to Case of the United States, vol. vi, pp. 145, 146.

federate cruisers in British ports during the whole course of the civil war, though it cannot be ascertained with accuracy, may be estimated to have amounted to about 2,800 tons. The aggregate amount similarly supplied to vessels of the United States cannot be estimated, from the want of data as to the supplies in many cases, but those cases only in which the quantities are recorded show a total of over 5,000 tons; and this notwithstanding the United States Navy had free access to their own coaling-depots, often close at hand. In one case noticed above, a vessel of war of the United States, the Vanderbilt, alone received 2,000 tons of coal at different British ports within the space of less than two months, being more than two-thirds of the whole amount obtained from first to last by confederate vessels.

It has been seen that of the three instances in which the United States assert that confederate vessels were allowed to coal in contravention of the rules of January 31, 1862, one alone, the coaling of the Florida at Barbados, can in any way be considered a departure from those rules, and that only in a limited sense.

Other instances of infractions of the rules by United States vessels are known to have occurred besides that of the Vanderbilt. The case of the Tuscarora has already been alluded to. The Kearsarge, after receiving 91 tons of coal at Dover, on the 2d of August, 1864, coaled again at Barbados, on the 23d of October. The Sacramento took in 874 tons at Cork between the 28th July and the 1st August in that year. She obtained 25 tons more at Plymouth, on the 16th of August, and 30 tons more were sent out to her from Dover by the United States consul, in a vessel which left without clearance for the purpose, on the 23d of the same month. It was not thought necessary to take any notice of this occurrence at the time, but a regulation was afterward made to prevent such a practice being resorted to in future for the purpose of evading the regulations. The United States vessel Wyoming made. use of the port of Hong-Kong in a similar manner, anchoring just outside of British waters, and obtaining coal and supplies in boats. This she did in February, 1863, and again in February, 1864. On the second occasion she is believed to have anchored within the British limits. She obtained 165 tons of coal, having been supplied in the previous December with 120 tons at the British colony at Labuan; and this, although there was a depot for the United States at Macao. The Narraganset again is recorded to have coaled twice within three months at Esquimaux Point, in British Columbia-once on the 23d of November, 1863, the second time in January, 1864.1

Her Majesty's government wishes to be understood as quoting these instances not in recrimination but in self-defense. There may not improbably have been, in some of these cases, reasons to excuse a departure from the strict letter of the regulations. All that it is sought to prove is that those regulations were not enforced against the vessels of the United States in any invidious manner; that the officers of the United States Navy were treated with courtesy and leniency, even when, on some occasions, their conduct did not show any very scrupulous respect for the conditions on which the hospitality of British ports was extended to them; and that the facts by which the United States seek to prove a lax observance, to their disadvantage, of the duties of neutrality, might with more justice be invoked in support of a directly opposite conclusion.

1 See Return of visits of United States vessels to British ports. Appendix to British Case, vol. v, pp. 228, 233, 234.

Her Majesty's government will ask the tribunal to suppose the case reversed-that the vessels of the Confederate States had been allowed the indulgences which were shown to those of the United States, and that United States vessels had been subjected to precautions such as were often enforced against confederate cruisers. A moment's reflection will show that, if complaints and claims are to be made on such grounds, the United States would have had much more reason to make them on such a supposition, than they have under the circumstances as they really stand.

[119] *Her Majesty's government regrets to have been compelled to lay before the tribunal in this section a number of details which have so slight a bearing on the questions referred to it, and many of which are so trivial in themselves. But it was due to the arbitrators, as well as to the United States, that this long series of accusations should not be left unanswered.

Course pursued by other countries.

COURSE PURSUED BY OTHER COUNTRIES.

Before quitting this subject, it may be well to notice briefly the course which was pursued under similar circumstances by other governments, whose conduct the United States have placed in contrast with that of Great Britain, and against whom they declare that they have no serious cause of complaint.1

Holland.

1. To instance, in the first place, the conduct of the Netherlands. The Sumter twice visited the ports of Dutch possessions in the East Indies within the space of six weeks; that of Saint Anne's, Curaçoa, on the 13th July, 1861; that of Paramaribo on the 19th August. On the first occasion she remained eight days in port; on the second, eleven days. In both instances she took in more than 100 tons of coal. At the British port of Trinidad the Sumter remained only six days and took in only 80 tons of coal. The United States Government addressed, as Mr. Seward said, "very serious remonstrances" to the Netherlands government on the subject. The essence of those remonstrances was, that the Sumter was not merely a privateer, but a pirate. The Netherlands government, on the other hand, maintained that she was a ship of war. It decided, however, to issue orders that no armed vessel of either belligerent should be allowed to remain more than forty-eight hours in Dutch ports, or to take in more coal than would be sufficient for twenty-four hours' consumption. Although the United States Government was expressly warned that this restriction must apply to vessels of their Navy, as well as to those of their opponents, the regulation was accepted as satisfactory, until applied to a United States ship, the Iroquois, which touched at Curaçoa in November, 1861. On learning the restrictions placed upon his visit, the commander of the Iroquois declined to enter the port upon such terms, and in this decision he was sustained by his Government, who called for a repeal of the obnoxious regulation. The Netherlands government, it appears, had already revoked the regulation, at the instance of the governor of Curaçoa, and they explained that no restrictions would in future be placed on the stay or supplies of American men-of-war in Dutch ports. The United States Government, however, were not satisfied. In February, 1862, Mr. Seward again directed the United States minister at the Hague to call attention to the "subject of the intrusion of piratical

American vessels seeking shelter in the ports of the Netherlands and their colonies.”

If he said you cannot obtain a decree excluding them altogether, it is thought that the Government will have no hesitation in restoring the restrictive policy which was adopted by it under the representation of its foreign affairs by Baron Van Zuylen.1

The Netherlands minister for foreign affairs replied, in a long and able note, in which he once more justified the attitude of his country, and declined to return to the former policy of restriction.

In this regard (he wrote) I permit myself to observe to you, that I could not understand how your Government could desire the re-establishment of measures which actually were, and would again, be applicable to both parties, and which were at the time the cause why the Union ship Iroquois would not enter the port of Curaçoa under the rule of the said restrictive measures. If the instructions given before the month of December, 1861, were now returned to, the government of the Netherlands might not only be taxed, with good reason, with trifling, but would hurt its own interests, as well as those of the Union, considering that the consequence of the said instructions would be, as has been remarked in the communication of Baron de Zuylen, dated October 29, 1861, that the vessels of war of the United States, also, could no longer be able to sojourn in the Netherland West Indian ports more than twice twentyfour hours, nor supply themselves with coal for a run of more than twenty-four hours. It is difficult to understand on what ground Great Britain is to be held liable for the acts of the Sumter, while the course pursued by Holland is considered to give the United States no serious cause of complaint. On looking for the reasons assigned, they are found to be as follows:

[120] *The governmont of the Netherlands forbade privateers to enter its ports, and warned the inhabitants of the Netherlands and the King's subjects abroad not to accept letters of marque. The United States have no knowledge that these orders were disobeyed.3

Her Majesty's government are not aware that, among the numerous charges brought against Great Britain in the case of the United States, it is anywhere alleged that a privateer of either party entered a British port, or that any British subject accepted a letter of marque during the war. It is indeed true that in official correspondence and in other documents and speeches during the war, it was the common practice of the Government and citizens of the United States to apply to the confederate cruisers the denomination of "privateers" as well as that of "pirates;" but it is certain that none of these cruisers were privateers in the legal and only proper sense of that term.

Brazil.

2. Let us now turn to the course adopted by Brazil. The Sumter, after leaving Paramaribo, touched at the port of San Juan de Maranham, where she remained ten days, and took in 100 tons of coal. The United States consul at that port addressed a protest to the governor, but the latter replied that the Sumter must be regarded as a belligerent vessel, and as such allowed to supply herself A long correspondence followed between the Brazilian government and the United States minister, who denounced the conduct of the President of the Province of Maranham as "an unfriendly act toward the United States, and a gross breach of neutrality," but the Brazilian government maintained that their officer had been right, that the Confederate States must be regarded as belligerents, and the Sumter as a ship of war. When, in June, 1862, after more than seven months discussion, the Marquis d'Abrantes, who had recently become Brazilian minister for foreign affairs, wrote to terminate the controversy,